Infrastructure of the Radio Access Network as an investment
The cost of building and maintaining network infrastructure is expensive. Commercial organizations, telecom operators, invest in construction, provide paid services to consumers, compensate for costs and make a profit.
The expediency of costs is determined by:
As a result, we are witnessing a battle for air and buildings in large cities, in the fields and forests there are base stations of large operators, regulators are thinking about eliminating digital inequality.
Wealthy consumers have the opportunity to build their own infrastructure - put Wi-Fi access points and connect them to a local network; there is an opportunity to purchase low-powered base stations operating in licensed bands from mobile operators. The quality of mobile communication will be better; the operator is profitable, since the consumer invests his money in the construction of network infrastructure.
Many operators cooperate in the construction of base stations - they divide the costs of building the tower and place their base stations next to them. Technically, there is no problem to use one base station to connect subscribers of different networks - in this case, the costs are even less. There are virtual mobile operators - they rent radio access channels from partners and provide services to their subscribers.
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The lease deal is essentially two-way. If there is a tenant, then there is a landlord. Such a landlord does not have to be an operator and serve its own subscribers - it is enough to build your own radio access network and you can rent it out to other operators. In this case, the lessor is the owner of the equipment, one or several operators take this equipment for rent and provide their services to subscribers. If the license for the frequency range belongs to the tenant, he rents only the equipment and decides which subscribers will use the channels on his frequencies. If a large landlord has acquired its own license for the frequency range, it can donate not just equipment, but channels on its frequencies to several operators at once, based on their own commercial interests. Operators who have their own licenses, he rents the same equipment.
Technically, there are no problems with a single antenna serving several licensed bands, there are nuances related to antenna geometry and radio wave propagation, but in the general case one can definitely say that the total cost of installing one base station to service all licensed and unlicensed frequencies will be cheaper than installing separate competing base stations or even individual towers.
From an engineering point of view, there is a need to reduce the power of individual base stations and increase their number. This is mentioned in the documents of the project 3gpp , the developer of fourth-generation LTE networks of 4G. It is easy to explain - if there is a small number of clients, say, several hundred, per unit square, say a square kilometer, then one powerful base station is enough for each client to have direct visibility to the antenna of the base station. With an increase in the number of clients, the likelihood of a conflict increases when one client overlaps another with direct visibility to the antenna of the base station. This problem is not solved by increasing the power of the transmitters of the clients or the base station - it is related to the geometry and statistics.
As a result, we take forecasts for the increase in devices on the Internet - the number of devices will be much larger than the population of the globe - due to robots, sensors and other IoT undead. On this basis, we conclude that we will need a huge number of low-power base stations. Outwardly, they will look like modern Wi-Fi access points. From the point of view of the cost of mass production, it will be advantageous to place a switch, a router, 4G and Wi-Fi low-power radio channels on a single chip and connect an antenna corresponding to a range of geometries to each channel. The difficult directional antenna is not required. The evolution of the base station can be safely compared with the evolution of a personal computer, which is entertainingly described in the Halt and Catch Fire series.
As a result, it is possible to imagine a situation when organizations of any size and even individuals can develop the network infrastructure. Technically, there is no problem to combine the laying of fiber optic highways with the laying of life support communications, such as electricity, water, gas supply. The cost of purchasing base stations can be compared with the cost of lighting the premises - a beautiful chandelier is more expensive today than an access point. Sales of services of such a network are guaranteed, and risks are eliminated, since it is beneficial to connect each access point directly to all operators. After all, even a farmer-hermit will visit his neighbor, and in this case his operator rents a radio access channel from the owner of the base station in order to connect his subscriber’s phone to his network.
Google has already said its Fi , the next move for hardware manufacturers. I imagine startup, where a small development team can already integrate several Atheros crystals or their competitors on a single printed circuit board today, develop software, show a prototype to investors, and pass the first round of financing. Then, experienced sales specialists will negotiate with operators and offer the finished product to consumers - municipalities, developers, private individuals.
The expediency of costs is determined by:
- The cost of the loan. It can not be zero - even if the organization uses its own funds, they can be loaned and make a profit;
- Sales forecast. Depends on the number of potential customers;
- Risks. Related to the competition.
As a result, we are witnessing a battle for air and buildings in large cities, in the fields and forests there are base stations of large operators, regulators are thinking about eliminating digital inequality.
Wealthy consumers have the opportunity to build their own infrastructure - put Wi-Fi access points and connect them to a local network; there is an opportunity to purchase low-powered base stations operating in licensed bands from mobile operators. The quality of mobile communication will be better; the operator is profitable, since the consumer invests his money in the construction of network infrastructure.
Many operators cooperate in the construction of base stations - they divide the costs of building the tower and place their base stations next to them. Technically, there is no problem to use one base station to connect subscribers of different networks - in this case, the costs are even less. There are virtual mobile operators - they rent radio access channels from partners and provide services to their subscribers.
')
The lease deal is essentially two-way. If there is a tenant, then there is a landlord. Such a landlord does not have to be an operator and serve its own subscribers - it is enough to build your own radio access network and you can rent it out to other operators. In this case, the lessor is the owner of the equipment, one or several operators take this equipment for rent and provide their services to subscribers. If the license for the frequency range belongs to the tenant, he rents only the equipment and decides which subscribers will use the channels on his frequencies. If a large landlord has acquired its own license for the frequency range, it can donate not just equipment, but channels on its frequencies to several operators at once, based on their own commercial interests. Operators who have their own licenses, he rents the same equipment.
Technically, there are no problems with a single antenna serving several licensed bands, there are nuances related to antenna geometry and radio wave propagation, but in the general case one can definitely say that the total cost of installing one base station to service all licensed and unlicensed frequencies will be cheaper than installing separate competing base stations or even individual towers.
From an engineering point of view, there is a need to reduce the power of individual base stations and increase their number. This is mentioned in the documents of the project 3gpp , the developer of fourth-generation LTE networks of 4G. It is easy to explain - if there is a small number of clients, say, several hundred, per unit square, say a square kilometer, then one powerful base station is enough for each client to have direct visibility to the antenna of the base station. With an increase in the number of clients, the likelihood of a conflict increases when one client overlaps another with direct visibility to the antenna of the base station. This problem is not solved by increasing the power of the transmitters of the clients or the base station - it is related to the geometry and statistics.
As a result, we take forecasts for the increase in devices on the Internet - the number of devices will be much larger than the population of the globe - due to robots, sensors and other IoT undead. On this basis, we conclude that we will need a huge number of low-power base stations. Outwardly, they will look like modern Wi-Fi access points. From the point of view of the cost of mass production, it will be advantageous to place a switch, a router, 4G and Wi-Fi low-power radio channels on a single chip and connect an antenna corresponding to a range of geometries to each channel. The difficult directional antenna is not required. The evolution of the base station can be safely compared with the evolution of a personal computer, which is entertainingly described in the Halt and Catch Fire series.
As a result, it is possible to imagine a situation when organizations of any size and even individuals can develop the network infrastructure. Technically, there is no problem to combine the laying of fiber optic highways with the laying of life support communications, such as electricity, water, gas supply. The cost of purchasing base stations can be compared with the cost of lighting the premises - a beautiful chandelier is more expensive today than an access point. Sales of services of such a network are guaranteed, and risks are eliminated, since it is beneficial to connect each access point directly to all operators. After all, even a farmer-hermit will visit his neighbor, and in this case his operator rents a radio access channel from the owner of the base station in order to connect his subscriber’s phone to his network.
Google has already said its Fi , the next move for hardware manufacturers. I imagine startup, where a small development team can already integrate several Atheros crystals or their competitors on a single printed circuit board today, develop software, show a prototype to investors, and pass the first round of financing. Then, experienced sales specialists will negotiate with operators and offer the finished product to consumers - municipalities, developers, private individuals.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/257479/
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